PR 4479 

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1 1895 
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THE RIME 



OF THE 



ANCiENT MARINER 



BY 



S. T. COLERIDGE 



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NewYork- Cincinnati • Chicago- 
_AmER1CAN*B00K- COM PANY' 



LiBRARY Of CONGRESS. 

Chap.. , Copyright M...Ai 

Slielf.___. 



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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 




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ECLECTIC ENGLISH CLASSICS 



THE RIME 



OF THE 



ANCIENT MARINER 






y I . BY 
S. T. COLERIDGE 



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NEW YORK • : • CINCINNATI • : • CHICAGO 

AMERICAN BOOK COMPANY 
1895 



Copyright, 1895, by 
American Book CoxMpany. 

ANCIENT MARINER. 
M. I 



INTRODUCTION. 



"As to my life," said Coleridge, " what I am depends on what I have 
been. ... It will perhaps make you behold with no unforgiving or impa- 
tient eye those weaknesses and defects in my character which so many un- 
toward circumstances have concurred in planting there." 



Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the youngest of a family of ten 
children, was born on the 21st of October, 1772. His father was 
vicar, and master of the school, of the parish of Ottery St. Mary, 
in the comity of Devon, England. The vicar " made the world 
his confidant with respect to his learning and ingenuity," wrote 
Coleridge, "and the world seems to have kept the secret very 
faithfully. His various works, uncut, unthumbed, were preserved 
free from all pollution in the family archives, where they may still 
be, for anything that I know. This piece of good luck promises 
to be hereditary ; for all wy compositions have the same amiable 
home-staying propensity. The truth is, my father was not a first- 
rate genius ; he was, however, a first-rate Christian, which is much 
better." Coleridge's mother was Ann Bowdon, whose family "in- 
herited a good farm, and house thereon, in the Exmoor country, 
in the reign of Ehzabeth," said her son ; " and to my knowledge 
they have inherited nothing better since that time. . . . My 
mother was an admirable economist, and managed exclusively. 

"From October, 1775, to October, 1778, ... I continued at 

5 



6 INTR OD UC TION. 

the reading school, because I was too httle to be trusted amon^ 
my father's schoolboys. After breakfast, I had a halfpenny 
given me, with which I bought three cakes at the baker's shoj 
close by the school of my old mistress ; and these were my dinne: 
every day except Saturday and Sunday, when I used to dine a 
home, and wallowed in a beef-and-pudding dinner. . . . Mj 
father was very fond of me, and I was my mother's darhng : ir 
consequence whereof I was very miserable. For Molly, who hac 
nursed my brother Francis, and was immoderately fond of him 
hated me because my mother took more notice of me than o: 
Frank ; and Frank hated me, because my mother gave me no\^ 
and then a bit of cake when he had none, quite forgetting, that 
for one bit of cake which I had and he had not, he had twenty sop: 
in the pan, and pieces of bread and butter with sugar on them 
from Molly, from whom I received only thumps and ill names. 

" So I became fretful and timorous and a telltale ; and th( 
schoolboys drove me from play, and were always tormenting 
me. And hence I took no pleasure in boyish sports, but reac 
incessantly. I read through all gilt-cover little books that coulc 
be had at that time, and hkewise all the uncovered tales o: 
'Tom Hickathrift,' 'Jack the Giant-Killer,' and the like. And J 
used to he by the wall, and mope. ... At six years of age ] 
remember to have read ' Belisarius,' ' Robinson Crusoe,' anc 
' Philip Quarles ; ' and then I found the ' Arabian Nights 
Entertainments.' . . . 

" So I became a dreamer, and acquired an indisposition to al 
bodily activity ; and I was fretful and inordinately passionate 
And as I could not play at anything, and was slothful, I wa< 
despised and hated by the boys ; and because I could read anc 
spell, and had, I may truly say, a memory and understanding 



INTR on UC TJON. 7 

forced into almost unnatural ripeness, I was flattered and won- 
dered at by all the old women. And so I became very vain, and 
despised most of the boys that were at all near my own age ; and 
before I was eight years old I was a character. Sensibility, ima- 
gination, vanity, sloth, and feehngs of deep and bitter contempt 
for almost all who traversed the orbit of my understanding, were 
even then prominent and manifest. . . . 

" After the death of my father [in October, 1781], wx of course 
changed houses, and I remained with my mother till the spring 
of 1782, and was a day scholar to Parson Warren, m}'- father's 
successor. . . . Somewhere, I think, about April, 1782, Judge 
Buller, who had been educated by my father, sent for me, having 
procured a Christ's Hospital presentation. I accordingly went 
to London, and was received and entertained by my mother's 
brother, Mr. Bowdon. . . . My uncle was very proud of me, and 
used to carry me from coffeehouse to coffeehouse, and tavern to 
tavern, where I drank and talked and disputed, as if I had been 
a man. Nothing was more common than for a large party to 
exclaim in my hearing that I was a prodigy, and so forth ; so that 
while I remained at my uncle's I was most completely spoiled and 
pampered, both mind and body." 

At length the time came, and Coleridge donned the blue coat 
and yellow stockings of Christ's Hospital. This is a famous 
school in London, founded three centuries and a half ago as a 
hospital for orphans. It is sometimes called the " Blue-Coat 
School," from the dress worn by the boys. Long ago it ceased 
to be a strictly charitable institution, and took on the character 
which Charles Lamb describes in his "Recollections" of his early 
years within its walls. 

" I was placed," says Coleridge, " in the second ward in the 



8 INTRODUCTION. 

under grammar school. There were twelve wards, or dormitories, 
of unequal sizes, besides the sick ward, in the great school ; and 
they contained altogether seven hundred boys, of whom I think 
nearly one third were the sons of clergymen. . . . 

" Oh, what a change ! — depressed, moping, friendless poor 
orphan, half starved. At that time the portion of food to the 
Blue- Coats was cruelly insufficient for those who had no friends 
to supply them." 

For eight years Coleridge continued at Christ's Hospital. In 
this time he prepared for Cambridge, and read omnivorously 
through the catalogue of a circulating library, "folios and all, 
whether I understood them or did not understand them, running 
all risks in skulking out to get the two volumes which I was 
entitled to have daily." 

At this great school he found as fellow-pupil Charles Lamb, — 
him of the "Recollections" just mentioned, — to whom he be- 
came the confidant, and to whom "his great and dear spirit" gave 
his confidence. " He was my fifty-year-old friend without a dis- 
sension," wrote Lamb a half century later. " Never saw I his 
likeness, nor probably the world can see it again." 

Coleridge entered Jesus College, Cambridge, in 1791. He 
" was very studious," said one of his fellows ; " but his reading 
was desultory and capricious. He took little exercise merely for 
the sake of exercise ; but he was ready at any time to unbend his 
mind in conversation ; and for the sake of this his room . . . was 
a constant rendezvous of conversation-loving friends. I will not 
call them loungers ; for they did not call to kill time, but to enjoy 
it. What evenings have I spent in those rooms ! What little 
suppers, or sizings, as they were called, have I enjoyed, when 
u^Eschylus and Plato and Thucydides were pushed aside, with a 



INTRODUCTION. 9 

pile of lexicons and the like, to discuss the pamphlets of the day! 
Ever and anon a pamphlet issued from the pen of Burke. There 
was no need of having the book before us : Coleridge had read 
it in the morning, and in the evening he would repeat whole pages 
verbatim." 

He had already begun earnest composition, and in 1793 he 
produced the " Songs of the Pixies," and other pieces. It was 
in this year that, harassed by debt and in despondency, he one 
day quitted Cambridge, and, going to London, enhsted as a 
private. When suddenly asked his name, he answered, " Cumber- 
back;" "and verily," said Coleridge, in telling of the incident, 
" my habits were so little equestrian, that my horse, I doubt not, 
was of that opinion." He served only a few months; for his 
utter unfitness for a military life was recognized by all who 
knew him, and through the interposition of friends he obtained 
a discharge, and returned to Cambridge. 

During his Cambridge course, he met Robert Southey, who was 
at that time a student at Oxford. " Coleridge," wrote Southey, 
" is of the strongest genius, the clearest judgment, the best heart." 
— " Verily, Southey," said Coleridge, in a letter from Wales, " thou 
art [at Oxford] a nightingale among owls." 

Coleridge returned from Wales, and went to Southey's home 
at Bristol, and there, with an associate few, all seized with the 
democratic spirit which was just then moving Southey, developed 
pantisocracy. This was to be a condition of affairs by which all 
should govern. With it was aspheritism, which meant " the hold- 
ing of all things in common." Coleridge bears evidence to his 
earnest adoption of the plan in his letters : '* Twelv^e men with 
their families emigrate. . . . Two thousand pounds should be 
the aggregate of their contributions. ... On the banks of the 



10 INTR OD UC TION. 

Susquehanna. . . . Literary characters may make ino7iey there. 
. . . The mosquitoes there are not so bad as our gnats. . . . Those 
of us whose bodies, from habits of sedentary study or academic 
indolence, have not acquired their full tone and strength, intend 
to learn the theory and practice of agriculture and carpentry." In 
accord with such enthusiasms, fate kindly led Coleridge to an 
acquaintance with and engagement to Sarah Fricker, " an honest, 
simple, lively-minded, affectionate woman." Southey was about 
to marry her sister. 

Coleridge left Cambridge. Pantisocracy ended in smoke ; and 
to-day the most substantial record of that time is the poets' joint 
drama of " The Fall of RobespieiTe," of which Southey wrote the 
second and third acts. But Coleridge gained enough money and 
fame in delivering public addresses, and in addresses in behalf of 
the Unitarian faith, to enable him to marry. 

The problem of bread and cheese could, he thought, be solved 
by his establishing a weekly paper, " The Watchman," which 
should " cry the state of the political atmosphere." To insure 
subscribers he ventured on an extended canvassing tour, in which 
his moral earnestness and extraordinary eloquence won him 
instant recognition, and applause which endured long afterwards. 
But the journal did not pay expenses. It was while engaged 
in such work that he published his first poems. In the following 
year (1797) he met Wilham Wordsworth. "The giant Words- 
worth," he wrote, " God love him ! When I speak in the terms 
of admiration due to his intellect, I fear lest these terms should 
keep out of sight the amiableness of his manners." — "Coleridge 
is a wonderful man," wrote Wordsworth's sister Dorothy: "his 
face teems with mind, soul, and spirit. Then he is so benevolent, 
so good-tempered and cheerful. ... At first I thought him plain ; 



INTRODUCTION. il 

that is, for about three minutes. He is pale, thin, has a wide 
mouth, thick Hps and not very good teeth, longish, loose-grow- 
ing, half-curhng, rough black hair. . . . His eye is large and full, 
and not very dark, but gray, — such an eye as would receive from 
a heavy soul the dullest expression ; but it speaks every emotion 
of his animated mind ; it has more of ' the poet's eye in a fine 
frenzy rolling ' than I have ever witnessed. He has fine dark 
eyebrows and overhanging forehead." 

It wa,s now that Coleridge and Wordsworth, meeting as friends 
and neighbors, talked together " on the two cardinal points of 
poetry," says Coleridge, in " Biographia Literaria," "and the 
power of exciting the sympathy of the reader by a faithful adher- 
ence to the truth of nature, and the power of giving the interest 
of novelty by the modifying colors of the imagination." In his 
endeavor to approach the ideal, Coleridge wrote " The Rime of 
the Ancient Mariner," "The Dark Ladie," and the first part of 
" Christabel." At this time, also, he produced " Kubla Khan," 
" The Three Graces," " France, an Ode," and other poems. Of 
the several periods of his changing hfe, this at Stowey, with his 
young wife and his baby son (who was later the poet Hartley 
Coleridge), and Wordsworth and Thomas Poole for friends, was 
the most productive and happy. 

Later on, when difiiculties arose and he was relieved from em- 
barrassment by the generous pension of the Wedgewood brothers, 
sons of Josiah Wedgewood, who founded the art of pottery in Eng- 
land, he went to Germany. Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy 
were his traveling comrades. Upon his return the next year, he 
translated Schiller's " Wallenstein," his "happiest attempt," he 
said, before he had been " buffeted by adversity, or cursed by fatal- 
ity." He now wrote for the " Morning Post " at a guinea a week. 



1 2 INTROD UCTION, 

At the end of two years he quitted London, and went to the 
Lake Country, still continuing on the " Post," however, and also 
giving some time to poetry. Wordsworth had already settled at 
Grasmere. 

After a trip to Scotland, which he made in company with the 
Wordsworths, he began the use of a medicine for the relief of 
rheumatism. The basis of the drug was opium. From this time, 
his hfe was changed. His buoyancy and sweetness of charac- 
ter were gone. The splendor and clearness of his genius were 
clouded. The love and peace of his home also, upon which he 
had dwelt in other days, were broken. From a strong, active, 
forceful man courageously fighting the battle of life, and winning 
fame for his wife and children, he became an hypochondriac 
invalid. The change was wrought by the "black drops." 

In 1804 he left his family at Greta Hall, living on the kindly 
dispensation of the Cheeryble Wedgewoods, with his brother-in- 
law, Southey. He went to Malta and to Rome. He returned to 
England "worse than homeless," he said. Lines which Words- 
worth wrote are thought to describe him at this time : — 

*' Ah ! piteous sight it was to see this man - 
When he came back to us a withered flower, 
Or, like a sinful creature, pale and wan. 
Down he would sit, and, without strength or power, 
Look at the common grass from hour to hour." 

Coleridge returned to I>ondon. He took up journalism, and 
lived miserably in an attic. He regained himself enough to 
lecture with applause upon the English poets. But notice the 
last clause in De Quincey's description : " On many of his lecture 
days I have seen all Albemarle Street closed by a ' lock ' of car- 
riages filled with women of distinction, until the servants of the 



INTR OD UC TION. 1 3 

institution, or their own footmen, advanced to the carriage door 
with the intelKgence that Mr. Coleridge had been taken suddenly 
ill. . . . The plea, which at first had been received with expres- 
sions of concern, repeated too often, began to cause disgust." 

At last Coleridge was reduced to the pass of asking to be 
allowed to condense police and parhamentary reports for news- 
papers. To cheat and overreach his recurring appetite, he engaged 
men to follow, and prevent him from buying opium. "Before 
God," he cried, " I have but one voice, — mercy, mercy ! woe is 
me. Pray for me that I may not pass such another night as the 
last. While I am awake, and retain my reasoning powers, the 
pang is gnawing ; but I am, except for a fitful moment or two, 
tranquil : it is the howling wilderness of sleep that I dread." 

In 18.11-12 he lectured again, these times upon Shakespeare 
and Milton, when he had among his auditors Byron and Lamb 
and Rogers. In 18 13 his play of " Osorio, or Remorse," was 
presented, witli a fair yield to the author. In 18 14 he began 
" Biographia Literaria." 

In 18 1 6 he took lodgings with Dr. Gillman, a physician who 
was living at Highgate, near London. In this retreat, where the 
kindest and most judicious treatment was shown him, Coleridge 
passed the rest of his life, rarely venturing into the world for any 
length of time. Though his emancipation from the slavery of his 
old habit was never complete, it was in a large measure accom- 
plished,, and he partially recovered his intellectual powers and his 
natural dignity and self-respect. In his writings of this period 
there are indications that he was occasionally troubled by fits of 
remorse ; but in the main his last years seem to have been hap- 
pily spent in study and literary production and in conversation 
with admiring friends. 



r 4 IN TROD UCTION. 

The year before his death, Coleridge wrote his own epitaph : — 

^' Stop, Christian passer-by ; stop, child of God, 
And read, with gentle breast. Beneath this sod 
A poet lies, or that which once seemed he — 
Oh, lift one thought in prayer for S. T. C. — 
That he who many a year with toil of breath 
Found death in life, may here find life in death; 
Mercy for praise — to be forgiven for fame — 
He asked, and hoped, through Christ. Do thou the same." 

After his death were published some of his specimens of the 
" Table Talk " of the last few years, his " Literary Remains," and 
other works. 

Coleridge did not live to see the popularity, or even the appre- 
ciation, of any of his works. In the opinions of reviewers of that 
day, the " Biographia Literaria " was "wild ravings." " Chris- 
tabel " was discredited in like manner, and also " The Rime of the 
Ancient Mariner." The latter poem had a prosaic origin. Cole- 
ridge and Wordsworth, with Dorothy Wordsworth, endeavored to 
defray the expenses of a short trip together by sending a poem 
to the " Nevi^ Monthly Magazine," hoping to receive as much as 
five pounds in pay. The poem was planned as they tramped off 
over the hills, Coleridge taking the theme from a dream which he 
had heard related by a friend, and Wordsworth suggesting the 
killing of the albatross as the crime which should be the cause of 
the Mariner's sufferings and the manning of the ship by dead 
men. Wordsworth tells us, that though the poem was intended 
to be a joint production, and was planned by the two poets 
together, he soon found that his friend's manner of composition 
was so different from his own, that it would be impossible to give 
him any aid, and so left Coleridge to write it alone. 



INTR OD UC TION. 1 5 

In commenting upon the poem, one of his biographers says 
that Coleridge " triumphs over his difficulties by sheer vividness 
of imagery and terse vigor of descriptive phrase. . . . His eye 
never seems to wander from his object. . . . The skeleton ship 
with the dicing demons on its deck; the setting sun peering 
through its ribs, ' as if through a dungeon grate ; ' the water 
snakes under the moonbeams, with ' the elfish light ' falling off 
them; . . . the dead crew, who work the ship, — everything seems 
to have been actually seen; and we believe it all as the story of 
a truthful eyewitness." 

" Coleridge," says Lowell, " has written some of the most poeti- 
cal poetry in the language, and one poem, the * Ancient Mariner,' 
not only unparalleled, but unapproached in its kind, and that 
kind of the rarest. It is marvelous in its mastery. . . . Coleridge 
has taken the old ballad measure, and given to it, by an inde- 
finable charm wholly his own, all the sweetness, all the melody and 
compass, of a symphony. And how picturesque it is in the 
proper sense of the word ! I know nothing like it. There is not 
a description in it. It is all picture. Descriptive poets gener- 
ally confuse us with multiplicity of detail ; we cannot see their 
forests for the trees. But Coleridge never errs in this way. 
With instinctive tact he touches the right chord of association, 
and is satisfied, as we also are. I should find it hard to explain 
the singular charm of his diction, there is so much nicety of art 
and purpose in it, whether for music or meaning. Nor does it 
need any explanation, for we all feel it. The words seem com- 
mon words enough ; but in the order of them, in the choice, variety, 
and position of the vowel sounds, they become magical." 



THE RIME^ OF THE ANCIENT 
MARINER. 

IN SEVEN PARTS. 



PART I. 



It is an ancient Mariner,^ 

And he stoppeth one of three. 

** By thy long gray beard and glittering eye, 

Now wherefore stopp'st thou me ? 



An ancient 
Mariner meeteth 
three gallants 
bidden to a wed- 
ding feast, and 
(detaineth one. 



'* The Bridegroom's doors are opened wide, 
And I am next of kin ; 
The guests are met, the feast is set : 
Mayst^ hear the merry din." 

He holds him with his skinny hand, 

" There was a ship," quoth he. 

" Hold off ! unhand me, graybeard loon ! " 

Eftsoons * his hand dropt he. 



1 The old and correct spelling of "rhyme." The latter form crept into 
use through the identification of the word with " rhythm." 

2 " This word was uniformly printed * marinere ' in 1798; and the rhyme 
in many places requires it to be pronounced so. In the first verse of Part 
VII. the old spelling is retained." 

3 The subject of " mayst " is " thou," understood. 

* From " eft," or " aft " (" again "), and " soon." ■ • 

2 T7 



i8 



The Wedding 
Guest is spell- 
bound by the eye 
of the old seafar- 
ing man, and 
constrained to 
hear his tale. 



SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERLDGE. 

He holds him with his ghttering eye— 
The Wedding Guest stood still, 
And listens ^ like a three-years' child : 
The Mariner hath his will. 



The Wedding Guest sat on a stone : 
He cannot choose but hear ; 
And thus spake on that ancient man, 
The bright-eyed Mariner: — 

" The ship was cheered, the harbor cleared, 

Merrily did we drop 

Below the kirk,^ below the hill, 

Below the lighthouse top. 



" The Sun came up upon the left, 
Out of the sea came he ! 



The Mariner tells 
how the ship 
sailed southward 
with a good wind 

and fair weather, And hc shonc bright, aud on the right 

till it reached the ° ' ° 

Line. 



Went down into the sea. 



" Higher and higher every day. 

Till over the mast at noon " ^ — 

The Wedding Guest here beat his breast. 

For he heard the loud bassoon.^ 



The Wedding The bride hath paced into the hall, 

Guest heareth the _ ^ ' 

bridal music ; but Red as a rosc is she ; 

the Mariner con- 

tinueth his tale. Nodding their heads before her, goes 



The merry minstrelsy. 



The Wedding Guest he beat his breast, 
Yet he cannot choose but hear ; 

1 " And listens," etc. Wordsworth suggested these two lines. 

2 The Scotch and north of England form of the word " church." 

3 At the equator, the sun would be directly overhead at noon. 

4 A musical wind instrument. 



THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER. 

And thus spake on that ancient man. 
The bright-eyed Mariner : — 



" And now the storm blast came, and he 
Was tyrannous and strong : 
He struck with his o'ertaking wings. 
And chased us south along. 



The ship drawn 
by a storm to- 
wards the south 
pole. 



" With sloping masts and dipping prow, 

As who pursued with yell and blow 

Still treads the shadow of his foe, 

And forward bends his head, 

The ship drove fast, loud roared the blast, 

And southward aye we fled. 

" And now there came both mist and snow, 
And it grew wondrous cold ; 
And ice, mast-high, came floating by, 
As green as emerald. 



" And through the drifts the snowy clifts ^ 
Did send a dismal sheen : 
Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken ^ — 
The ice was all between. 



The land of ice, 
and of fearful 
sounds, where no 
living thing was 
to be seen. 



" The ice was here, the ice was there, 

The ice was all around : 

It cracked and growled, and roared and howled, 

Like noises in a swound 1 ^ 



" At length did cross an Albatross 
Thorough ^ the fog it came ; 



Till a great sea 
bird, called the 
Albatross, came 



1 Cliffs. 

2 Descry. This word is allied to, and often means, " know." 

3 Swoon. 4 Old form of " through." 



20 

through the 
snow fog, and 
was received with 
great joy and 
hospitality. 



And lo! the Al- 
batross proveth a 
bird of good 
omen, andfollow- 
eth the ship as it 
returned north- 
ward, through 
fog and floating 



SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE. 

As if it had been a Christian soul, 
We hailed it in God's name. 

" It ate the food it ne'er had eat/ 
And round and round it flew. 
The ice did split with a thunder fit ;2 
The helmsman steered us through ! 

" And a good south wind sprung up behind ; 

The Albatross did follow, 

And every day, for food or play, 

Came to the mariners' hollo ! 

" In mist or cloud, on mast or shroud. 

It perched for vespers ^ nine ; 

Whiles all the night, through fog smoke white, 

GHmmered the white moonshine." 



The ancient 
Mariner inhospi- 
tably killeth the 
pious bird of 
good omen. 



" God save thee, ancient Mariner, 
From the fiends that plague thee thus ! 
Why look'st thou so ? "— " With my crossbow 
I shot the Albatross. 



PART 11. 



" The Sun now rose upon the right,* 
Out of the sea came he. 
Still hid in mist, and on the left 
Went down into the sea. 



1 Another form of " eaten." 

2 A noise resembling thunder. 

3 Evenings. The word comes to us from the Greek, in Avhich it had the 
form " hesperos," and is commonly used to describe the evening star. 

* They have doubled Cape Horn, and are sailing northward. 



THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER. 

" And the good south wind still blew behind ; 
But no sweet bird did follow, 
Nor any day, for food or play, 
Came to the mariners' hollo ! 



" And I had done a hellish thing. 

And it would work 'em woe ; 

For all averred, I had killed the bird 

That made the breeze to blow. 

' Ah, wretch ! ' said they, * the bird to slay, 

That made the breeze to blow ! ' 



His shipmates 
cry out against 
the ancient 
Mariner for kill- 
ing the bird of 
good luck. 



" Nor dim nor red, like God's own head,i 

The glorious Sun uprist:^ 

Then all averred, I had killed the bird 

That brought the fog and mist. 

* 'Twas right,' said they, ' such birds to slay, 

That brinix the foe: and mist.' 



But when the fog 
cleared off, they 
justify the same, 
and thus make 
themselves ac- 
complices in the 
crime. 



" The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew, 

The furrow followed free : 

We were the first that ever burst 

Into that silent sea. 



The fair breeze 
continues; the 
ship enters the 
Pacific Ocean, 
and sails north- 
ward, even till it 
reaches the Line. 



" Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt down, 
'Twas sad as sad could be ; 
And we did speak only to break 
The silence of the sea ! 



The ship hath 
been suddenly 
becalmed. 



" All in a hot and copper sky. 
The bloody Sun, at noon. 
Right up above the mast did stand, 
No bigger than the Moon. 

1 " Like God's," etc., a forcible simile of the grandeur of the rising sun. 

2 An old form of " uprose." 



22 



SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE. 

" Day after day, day after day, 
We stuck, nor breath nor motion ; 
As idle as a painted ship 
Upon a painted ocean. 



And the Alba- 
tross begins to be 
avenged. 



"Water, water, everywhere, 
And all the boards did shrink 
Water, water, everywhere, 
Nor any drop to drink. 



'' The very deep did rot. O Christ ! 
That ever this should be ! 
Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs 
Upon the slimy sea. 

" About, about, in reel and rout. 
The death fires ^ danced at night ; 
The water, like a witch's oils. 
Burnt green and blue and white.2 



A spirit had fol- 
lowed them ; one 
of the invisible in- 
habitants of this 
planet, neither 
departed souls 
nor angels. 



" And some in dreams assured were 
Of the spirit that plagued us so : 
Nine fathom deep he had followed us, 
From the land of mist and snow. 



*' And every tongue, through utter drought. 
Was withered at the root ; 
We could not speak, no more than if 
We had been choked with soot. 



The shipmates, "Ah, welladay !^ what evil looks 

in their sore dis- tt i t r ^ ■> j 

tress, would fain Had 1 from oM and young ! 

1 "St. Elmo's lights;" a luminous discharge of atmospheric electricity 
about the rigging of ships, supposed by superstitious sailors to presage death 
and disaster, 2 The phosphorescent lights of the breaking water. 

3 Corrupted from " welaway " (" alas "). 



THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER. 



23 



Instead of the cross, the Albatross 
About my neck was hung. 



PART III. 



throw the whole 
guilt on the 
ancient Mariner; 
in sign whereof 
they hang the 
dead sea bird 
round his neck. 



" There passed a weary time. Each throat 

Was parched, and glazed each eye. 

A weary time ! a weary time ! 

How glazed each weary eye ! 

When looking westward I beheld 

A something in the sky. 



The ancient 
Mariner behold- 
eth a sign in the 
element afar off. 



" At first it seemed a little speck, 
And then it seemed a mist. 
It moved and moved, and took at last 
A certain shape, I wist.^ 

" A speck, a mist, a shape, I wist ! 
And still it neared and neared : 
As if it dodged a water sprite. 
It plunged and tacked and veered. 



" With throats unslaked, with black lips baked, 

We could nor laugh nor wail ; 

Through utter drought all dumb we stood ! 

I bit my arm, I sucked the blood. 

And cried, ' A sail ! a sail ! ' 



At its nearer 
approach, it 
seemeth him to 
be a ship ; and at 
a dear ransom he 
freeth his speech 
from the bonds 
of thirst 



" With throats unslaked, with black lips baked, 
Agape they heard me call. 
Gramercy ! ^ they for joy did grin, 
And all at once their breath drew in, 
As they were drinking all. 

1 Past tense of an old verb, " wit " (" to know "). 

2 Many thanks, from the French grand merci. 



A flash of joy. 



24 



SAMUEL "TAYLOR COLERIDGE. 



And horror fol- 
lows. For can it 
be a ship that 
comes onward 
without wind 
or tide ? 



'* ' See ! see ! ' I cried, ' she tacks no more 
Hither^ to work us weal ^ — 
Without a breeze, without a tide, 
She steadies ^ with upright keel ! * 



It seemeth hins 
but the skeleton 
of a ship. 



" The western wave was all aflame ; 

The day was well-nigh done ; 

Almost upon the western wave 

Rested the broad bright Sun ; 

When that strange shape drove suddenly 

Betwixt us and the Sun. 

** And straight ^ the Sun was flecked with bars, 
(Heaven's Mother send us grace ! ) 
As if through a dungeon grate he peered, 
With broad and burning face. 

" 'Alas !' thought I, and my heart beat loud, 
' How fast she nears and nears ! 
Are those her sails that glance in the Sun, 
Like restless gossameres ? * 



And its ribs are 
seen as bars on 
the face of the 
setting Sun. The 
Specter Woman 
and her Death 
mate, and no 
other, on board 
the skeleton ship. 



" ' Are those her ribs through which the Sun 
Did peer, as through a grate ? 
And is that Woman all her crew ? 
Is that a Death ? and are there two ? 
Is Death that Woman's mate ? ' 



Like vessel, 
like crew ! 



" Her lips were red, her looks were free, 
Her locks were yellow as gold ; 
Her skin was as white as leprosy. 
The nightmare Life-in-Death was she, 
Who thicks man's blood with cold. 



1 Well-being; happiness; allied to "well," "wealth." 

2 Comes steadily on. 3 Straightway ; immediately. 
* Gossamejs ; threads of cobweb floating in the air. 



THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER. 



" The naked hulk alongside came, 
And the twain were casting dice : 
'The game is done ! I've, I've won 
Quoth she, and whistles thrice. 



Death and Life- 
in-Death have 
diced for the 
ship's crew, and 
she (the latter) 
winneth the 
ancient Mariner. 



" The Sun's rim dips ; the stars rush out 
At one stride comes the dark : 
With far-heard whisper, o'er the sea, 
Off shot the specter bark. 



No twilight 
within the courts 
of the Sun. 



" We listened, and looked sideways up ! 

Fear at my heart, as at a cup. 

My lifeblood seemed to sip ! ^ 

The stars were dim, and thick the night ; 

The steersman's face by his lamp gleamed white 

From the sails the dew did drip. 

Till clomb 2 above the eastern bar 

The horned Moon, with one bright star 

Within the nether '^ tip. 



At the rising of 
the Moon, 



" One after one, by the star-dogged ^ Moon, 
Too quick for groan or sigh, 
Each turned his face with a ghastly pang, 
And cursed me with his eye. 



One after an- 
other. 



" Four times fifty living men 
(And I heard nor sign nor groan). 
With heavy thump, a lifeless lump, 
They dropped down one by one. 



His shipmates 
drop down dead. 



1 " Fear at my heart," etc., i.e., fear seemed to draw my lifeblood, as 
though by a cupping glass (a glass formerly used to draw blood from a patient, 
by creating a partial vacuum over the spot). 

2 An old past tense of " climb." 3 Lower. 

4 The star following the crescent moon, as a dog follows the heels of his 
master. 



26 



SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERLDGE. 



Put Life-in- 
Death begins her 
work on the an- 
cient Mariner. 



"The souls did from their bodies fly, — 
They fled to bhss or woe ! 
And every soul, it passed me by, 
Like the whiz of my crossbow ! " 



PART IV. 



The Wedding 
Guest feareth 
that a spirit is 
talking to him. 



" I fear thee, ancient Mariner ! 

I fear thy skinny hand ! 

And thou art long and lank and brown. 

As is the ribbed sea sand.^ 



But the ancient 
Mariner assureth 
him of his bodily 
life, and pro- 
ceedeth to relate 
his horrible 
penance. 



" I fear thee and thy glittering eye. 
And thy skinny hand, so brown ! " — 
" Fear not, fear not, thou Wedding Guest ! 
This body dropped not down. 

"Alone, alone, all, all alone. 
Alone on a wide, wide sea ! 
And never a saint took pity on 
My soul in agony. 



He despiseth the 
creatures of the 
calm. 



" The many men, so beautiful ! 
And they all dead did lie : 
And a thousand thousand slimy things 
Lived on ; and so did I. 



And envieth that 
they should live, 
and so many lie 
dead. 



" I looked upon the rotting sea, 
And drew my eyes away ; 
I looked upon the rotting deck, 
And there the dead men lay. 



1 " And thou art long," etc. 
to Wordsworth. 



For these two lines, Coleridge was indebted 



THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER. 

" I looked to heaven, ar;d tried to pray ; 
But or ever a prayer had gusht, 
A wicked whisper came, and made 
My heart as dry as dust. 

" I closed my lids, and kept them close, 

And the balls hke pulses beat ; 

For the sky and the sea, and the sea and the sky, 

Lay like a load on my weary eye, 

And the dead were at my feet. 



27 



" The cold sweat melted from their limbs. 
Nor rot nor reek did they : 
The look with which they looked on me 
Had never passed away. 



But the curse 
liveth for him in 
the eye of the 
dead men. 



"An orphan's curse would drag to hell 

A spirit from on high ; 

But oh ! more horrible than that 

Is the curse in a dead man's eye ! 

Seven days, seven nights, I saw that curse, 

And yet I could not die. 



In his loneliness 
and fixedness he 
yearneth towards 
the journeying 
Moon, and the 
stars 1 that still 
sojourn, yet still 
move onward ; 

and everywhere the blue sky belongs to them, and is their appointed rest, and their native 
coiintry, and their own natural homes, which they enter unannounced, as lords that are cer- 
tainly expected, and yet there is a silent joy at their arrival. 



" The moving Moon went up the sky. 
And nowhere did abide : 
Softly she was going up. 
And a star or two beside. 



" Her beams bemocked the sultry main, 
Like April hoarfrost spread ; 



1 " To this exquisite gloss there is nothing to correspond in the text. 
Some such thoughts, which he but vaguely grasps and does not attempt to 
express, must be supposed to pass through the brain of the Mariner." 



28 



SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERLDGE. 

But where the ship's huge shadow lay, 
The charmed water burnt alway 
A still and av/ful red. 



By the light of 
the Moon he be- 
holdeth God's 
creatures of the 
great calm. 



" Beyond the shadow of the ship 

I watched the water snakes : 

They moved in tracks of shining white, 

And when they reared, the elfish Hght 

Fell off in hoary flakes. 



"Within the shadow of the ship 

I watched their rich attire ; 

Blue, glossy green, and velvet black, 

They coiled and swam ; and every track 

Was a flash of golden fire. 



Their beauty and 
their happiness. 



He blesseth them 
in his heart. 



" O happy living things ! no tongue 

Their beauty might declare : 

A spring of love gushed from my heart, 

And I blessed them unaware ! 

Sure my kind saint took pity on me. 

And I blessed them unaware. 



The spell begins 
to break. 



" The selfsame moment I could pray ; 
And from my neck so free 
The Albatross fell off, and sank 
Like lead into the sea. 



PART V. 



" O sleep ! it is a gentle thing. 
Beloved from pole to pole ! 
To Mary Queen the praise be given ! 
She sent the gentle sleep from heaven, 
That slid into my soul. 



THE RIME 01^ THE ANCIENT MARINER. 



29 



"The silly 1 buckets on the deck, 
That had so long remained, 
I dreamt that they were filled with dew ; 
And when I awoke, it rained. 



By grace of the 
holy Mother, the 
ancient Mariner 
is refreshed with 
rain. 



" My lips were wet, my throat was cold. 
My garments all were dank ; 
Sure I had drunken in my dreams. 
And still my body drank. 

" I moved, and could not feel my limbs ; 
I was so light — almost 
I thought that I had died in sleep. 
And was a blessed ghost. 



" And soon I heard a roaring wind : 
It did not come anear; 
But with its sound it shook the sails, 
That were so thin and sere. 



He heareth 
sounds, and seeth 
strange sights 
and commotions 
in the sky and 
the element. 



" The upper air burst into life ! 
And a hundred fire flags sheen,^ 
To and fro they were hurried about ; 
And to and fro, and in and out. 
The wan stars danced between. 

" And the coming wind did roar more loud, 
And the sails did sigh Hke sedge ; 
And the rain poured down from one black cloud ; 
The Moon was at its edge. 



" The thick black cloud was cleft, and still 
The Moon was at its side : 

1 Empty ; useless. 

2 The shining, or splendor, of a hundred flashes, or gleams of lightning. 



so 



SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERLDGE. 



Like waters shot from some high crag, 
The lightning fell with never a jag/ 
A river steep and wide. 



The bodies of the 
ship's crew are 
inspirited, and 
the ship moves 
on; 



"The loud wind never reached the ship, 
Yet now the ship moved on! 
Beneath the hghtning and the Moon 
The dead men gave a groan. 



" They groaned, they stirred, they all uprose, 
Nor spake, nor moved their eyes ; 
It had been strange, even in a dream, 
To have seen those dead men rise. 

" The helmsman steered, the ship moved on ; 

Yet never a breeze upblew ; 

The mariners all 'gan work the ropes, 

Where they were wont to do : 

They raised their limbs like lifeless tools— 

We were a ghastly crew. 

" The body of my brother's son 
Stood by me, knee to knee ; 
The body and I pulled at one rope, 
But he said naught to me." 



But not by the 
souls of the men, 
nor by demons of 
earth or middle 
air, but by a 
blessed troop of 
angelic spirits, 
sent down by the 
invocation of the 
guardian saint. 



" I fear thee, ancient Mariner ! " — 
" Be calm, thou Wedding Guest ! 
'Twas not those souls that fled in pain 
Which to their corses came again, 
But a troop of spirits blest. 

" For when it dawned, they dropped their arms, 
And clustered round the mast ; 
With never a break or zigzag, but straight down. 



THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER. 31 

Sweet sounds rose slowly through their mouths, 
And from their bodies passed. 

" Around, around, flew each sweet sound, 
Then darted to the Sun ; 
Slowly the sounds came back again, 
Now mixed, now one by one. 

" Sometimes adropping from the sky 
I heard the skylark sing ; 
Sometimes all little birds that are. 
How they seemed to fill the sea and air 
With their sweet jargoning ! ^ 

" And now 'twas like all instrumftits, 
Now like a lonely flute ; 
And now it is an angel's song. 
That makes the heavens be mute. 

" It ceased ; yet still the sails made on 

A pleasant noise till noon, 

A noise like of a hidden brook 

In the leafy month of June, 

That to the sleeping woods all night 

Singeth a quiet tune. 

" Till noon we quietly sailed on, 
Yet never a breeze did breathe ; 
Slowly and smoothly went the ship, 
Moved onward from beneath. 



The lonesome 
spirit from the 



" Under the keel nine fathom deep. 

From the land of mist and snow, south pole carries 

' on the ship as tar 

1 In using the word in this way, Coleridge takes it back to the old French 
jargonner (" to chirp and chatter as birds "). 



32 



SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE. 



as the Line, in 
obedience to the 
angelic troop, 
but still requireth 
vengeance. 



The spirit slid ; and it was he 
That made the ship to go. 
The sails at noon left off their tune, 
And the ship stood still also. 



" The Sun, right up above the mast. 
Had fixed her to the ocean ; 
But in a minute she 'gan stir 
With a short uneasy motion — 
Backwards and forwards half her length, 
With a short uneasy motion. 

" Then, like a pawing horse let go. 
She made a sudden bound : 
It flung the bloofl into my head, 
And I fell down in a swound. 



The Polar 
Spirit's fellow- 
demons, the in- 
visible inhabit- 
ants of the ele- 
ment, take part 
in his wrong ; and 
two of them re- 
late, one to the 
other, that pen- 
ance long and 
heavy for the 
ancient Mariner 
hath been ac- 
corded to the 
Polar Spirit, who 
returneth south- 
ward. 



" How long in that same fit I lay, 
I have not to declare ; 
But ere my hving life returned, 
I heard, and in my soul discerned, 
Two voices in the air. 

" ' Is it he ? ' quoth one, ' is this the man ? 
By Him who died on cross. 
With his cruel bow he laid full low 
The harmless Albatross. 



" ' The spirit who bideth by himself 
In the land of mist and snow. 
He loved the bird that loved the man 
Who shot him with his bow.' 



" The other was a softer voice. 
As soft as honeydew. 



THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER. 



2>2i 



Quoth he, ' The man hath penance done, 
And penance more will do.' 



PART VI. 



First Voice. 



" ' But tell me, tell me ! speak again, 
Thy soft response renewing, — 
What makes that ship drive on so fast ? 
What is the Ocean doing ? ' 

Seco7id Voice. 

" ' Still as a slave before his lord, 
The Ocean hath no blast ; 
His great bright eye most silently 
Up to the Moon is cast, 

" * If he may know which way to go ; 
For she guides him, smooth or grim. 
See, brother, see ! how graciously 
She looketh down on him.' 

First Voice. 



" ' But why drives on that ship so fast, 
Without or wave or wind ? ' 

Seco7id Voice. 

" ' The air is cut away before. 
And closes from behind. 



The Mariner 
hath been cast 
into a trance ; 
for the angelic 
power causeth 
the vessel to drive 
northward faster 
than human life 
could endure. 



34 



SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERLDGE. 

Fly, brother, fly ! more high, more high ! 
Or we shall be belated ; 
For slow and slow that ship will go, 
When the Mariner's trance is abated.' 



" I woke, and we were saihng on, 
As in a gentle weather : 



The supernatural 
motion is re- 
tarded ; the 
Mariner awakes, 

and his penance 'Twas night, Calm night, the Moon was high ; 

begins anew. o o o 



The dead men stood together. 



" All stood together on the deck, 
For a charnel dungeon fitter ; 
All fixed on me their stony eyes, 
That in the Moon did glitter. 

" The pang, the curse, with which they died, 
Had never passed away : 
I could not draw my eyes from theirs. 
Nor turn them up to pray. 



The curse is 
finally expiated. 



" And now this spell was snapt : once more 

I viewed the ocean green, 

And looked far forth, yet little saw 

Of what had else been seen — 



" Like one that on a lonesome road 

Doth walk in fear and dread. 

And having once turned round walks on. 

And turns no more his head. 

Because he knows a frightful fiend 

Doth close behind him tread. 



" But soon there breathed a wind on me, 
Nor sound nor motion made : 



THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER. 

Its path was not upon the sea, 
In ripple or in shade. 



35 



" It raised m}^ hair, it fanned my cheek 
Like a meadow gale of spring ; 
It mingled strangely with my fears, 
Yet it felt like a welcoming. 

" Swiftly, swiftly, flew the ship. 
Yet she sailed softly too ; 
Sweetly, sweetly, blew the breeze — 
On me alone it blew. 



" Oh, dream of joy ! is this indeed 
The lighthouse top I see ? 
Is this the hill ? is this the kirk ? 
Is this mine own countree ? ^ 



And the ancient 
Mariner behoid- 
eth his native 
country. 



" We drifted o'er the harbor bar, 
And I with sobs did pray, — 
' O let me be awake, my God! 
Or let me sleep alway.' 

" The harbor bay was clear as glass, 
So smoothly it was strewn ; 
And on the bay the moonlight lay, 
And the shadow of the Moon. 



" The rock shone bright, the kirk no less, 
That stands above the rock ; 
The moonlight steeped in silentness 
The steady weathercock. 

1 An old form, sometimes used in poetry, preserving the termination of 
the old French word for " country," 



36 SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERLDGE. 

" And the bay was white with silent light, 
The angelic spir- Till, lising from the same, 

its leave the dead -r- -n i .i , i i 

bodies, Full many shapes, that shadows were. 

In crimson colors came. 



And appear in " A little distance from the prow 

their own forms rr>A • i j 

of light. Those crimson shadows were: 

I turned my eyes upon the deck — 

Christ ! what saw I there 1 

" Each corse lay flat, hfeless and flat, 
And, by the holy rood ! ^ 
A man all light, a seraph man, 
On every corse there stood. 

" This seraph band, each waved his hand : 
It was a heavenly sight ! 
They stood as signals to the land, 
Each one a lovely light ; 

" This seraph band, each waved his hand. 
No voice did they impart, — 
No voice ; but oh ! the silence sank 
Like music on my heart. 

" But soon I heard the dash of oars, 

1 heard the Pilot's cheer ; 

My head was turned perforce away, 
And I saw a boat appear. 

" The Pilot, and the Pilot's boy, 
I heard them coming fast : 
Dear Lord in heaven ! it was a joy 
The dead men could not blast. 

1 " The holy rod " or " rood," i.e., the cross or crucifix. 



THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER. 37 

*' I saw a third — I heard his voice : 

It is the Hermit good ! 

He singeth loud his godly hymns 

That he makes in the wood. 

He'll shrieve 1 my soul, he'll wash away 

The Albatross's blood. 



PART VII. 

" This Hermit good lives in that wood 

txr, • •. , 1 1 The Hermit of 

Which slopes down to the sea. the wood 

How loudly his sweet voice he rears ! 
He loves to talk with marineres ^ 
That come from a far countree. 

" He kneels at morn and noon and eve ; 

He hath a cushion plump : 

It is the moss that wholly hides 

The rotted old oak stump. 

" The skiff boat neared ; I heard them talk : 
* Why, this is strange, I trow ! 
Where are those lights so many and fair, 
That signal made but now ? ' 

" * Strange, by my faith ! ' the Hermit said ; Approacheth the 

ship with won- 

And they answered not our cheer ! der. 

The planks look warped ! and see those sails, 
How thin they are and sere ! 
I never saw aught like to them, 
Unless perchance it were 

1 An old form of " shrive;" to receive confession, and grant absolution. 

2 See Note 2, p. 17. 



3^ SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE, 

" Brown skeletons of leaves that lag 
My forest brook along, 
When the ivy tod i is heavy with snow, 
And the owlet whoops to the wolf below, 
That eats the she-wolf's young.' 

" * Dear Lord ! it hath a fiendish look,' 
The Pilot made reply : 
' I am afeared.'— ' Push on, push on !' 
Said the Hermit cheerily. 

"The boat came closer to the ship, 
But I nor spake nor stirred ; 
The boat came close beneath the ship, 
And straight 2 a sound was heard. 

" Under the water it rumbled on, 
ly slnkefh!" ^"" Still loudcr aud more dread ; 

It reached the ship, it split the bay : 
The ship went down like lead. 

" Stunned by that loud and dreadful sound, 

The ancient Tin • i i i 

Mariner is saved VV luch sky and oceau suiote, 

boat.*" '°'^ Like one that hath been seven days drowned, 

My body lay afloat ; 

But swift as dreams, myself I found 

Within the Pilot's boat. 

" Upon the whirl, where sank the ship. 
The boat spun round and round ; 
And all was still, save that the hill 
Was telling of the sound. 

"I moved my lips— the Pilot shrieked. 
And fell down in a fit ; 
1 A bush or thick mass of ivy. ^ gee Note 3, p. 24. 



THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER. 



39 



The holy Hermit raised his eyes. 
And prayed where he did sit. 

" I took the oars : the Pilot's boy, 

Who now doth crazy go, 

Laughed loud and long, and all the while 

His eyes went to and fro. 

'Ha, ha ! ' quoth he, ' full plain I see 

The Devil knows how to row.' 

" And now, all in my own countree, 
I stood on the firm land ! 
The Hermit stepped forth from the boat, 
And scarcely he could stand. 



" ' O shrieve me, shrieve me, holy man ! 
The Hermit crossed his brow. 
* Say quick,' quoth he, ' I bid thee say, 
What manner of man art thou ? ' 



The ancient 
Mariner earnest- 
ly entreateth the 
Hermit to shrieve 
him ; and the 
penance of Hfe 
falls on him. 



" Forthwith this frame of mine was wrenched 

With a woeful agony. 

Which forced me to begin my tale ; 

And then it left me free. 



" Since then, at an uncertain hour, 
That agony returns ; 
And till my ghastly tale is told, 
This heart within me burns. 



And ever and 
anon throughout 
his future life an 
agony constrain- 
eth him to travel 
from land to 
land. 



" I pass, like night, from land to land ; 
I have strange power of speech ; 
That moment that his face I see, 
I know the man that must hear me : 
To him my tale I teach. 



40 SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE. 

" What loud uproar bursts from that door ! 

The wedding guests are there ; 

But in the garden bower the bride 

And bridemaids singing are ; 

And hark the httle vesper bell, 

Which biddeth me to prayer ! 

" O Wedding Guest ! this soul hath been 
Alone on a wide wide sea : 
So lonely 'twas, that God himself 
Scarce seemed there to be. 

" Oh, sweeter than the marriage feast, 

'Tis sweeter far to me, 

To walk together to the kirk 

With a goodly company, — 

" To walk together to the kirk, 

And all together pray, 

While each to his great Father bends, — 

Old men, and babes, and loving friends, 

And youths and maidens gay ! 



And to teach, by " Farcwell, farewell ! but this I tell 

his own example, rr« i i -itt i t /^ 

love and rever- lo thee, thou Wedamg Guest, — 

tharG°odmade^^ He praycth well who loveth well 

and loveth. 



Both man and bird and beast. 

" He prayeth best who loveth best 
All things, both great and small ; 
For the dear God who loveth us. 
He made and loveth all." 

The Mariner, whose eye is bright, 
Whose beard with age is hoar. 



THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER. 41 

Is gone ; and now the Wedding Guest 
Turned from the bridegroom's door. 

He went Hke one that hath been stunned, 
And is of sense forlorn : ^ 
A sadder and a wiser man 
He rose the morrow morn. 

1 Deprived; bereft. 



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